


ReSeT

by rinrambles



Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Deja Vu, Gen, SAVING and Resetting, reset
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-03
Updated: 2016-02-03
Packaged: 2018-05-18 01:18:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,894
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5892547
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rinrambles/pseuds/rinrambles
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>sans notices that he's done things before...</p>
            </blockquote>





	ReSeT

_this isn’t happening…_ sans thinks to himself as he watches the human (so that’s what they look like) take down Papyrus. 

 _i never should have told them about blue attacks…_ sans thinks as he runs.  He hadn’t thought the kid would… !!!

Papyrus’ bones are dust as sans reaches them.  sans looks for the human, power that he rarely uses singing in his bones, but the human is gone.

~~

“SANS WAKE UP!” Papyrus yells, banging on the door. 

sans sits upright in bed.  His eyes sting at the image of Papyrus…

He throws the covers off and bolts to the door.  He swings the door open and Papyrus is standing there, about to knock again.  His mouth hangs open for a second in confusion before his face softens.  To be honest, nothing really changes, but sans knows the difference.  Slowly, sans wraps his arms around his brother and hugs him.

Papyrus hugs back.  “WHAT’S WRONG, BRO?” he asks. 

“oh, uh, this pasta night, uh, I didn’t sleep very well…”

Papyrus’ lower jaw hangs slack to one side a little, like it does every time sans makes a joke. 

“YOU STILL HAVE A JOB,” he says.

“of course, of course,” sans replies, trying to act casual.  Inside, his mind is reeling.  It had felt so real! But this was obviously reality.  It had been a nightmare.  Only a nightmare.  “put out a bottle of ketchup for me, will ya?”

He closes the door before Papyrus can respond.  He needs time to compose himself. 

~~

It doesn’t take sans long to decide that Papyrus doesn’t remember.  Papyrus is good at being happy and enthusiastic about everything.  There’s no way he could keep that up after what sans had seen.

But, it could also mean that sans had truly dreamed up Papyrus’ death.  As he meanders around town, there is no talk of a human—a subject that would surely turn heads and spark whispers.  He’d dreamt it all up, apparently.

sans goes on duty.  For once, he intends to run into the obnoxious flower, Flowey—such an unbelievably unoriginal name, reminding sans of some of the names the King thinks up.   It won’t be the first time sans has encountered him.  Papyrus and the flower got along, well, as well as Papyrus could get along with something who hated everything.  sans could have sworn he’d actually killed the flower a few times, but it kept coming back. 

That’s why sans wants to talk to Flowey.

When sans finally runs into the flower, the flower has a bemused expression on its face. 

“Have you actually ever died?” sans asks.

“Technically, I’m a flower,” Flowey responds, making a big show of examining a leaf. 

“Yes, but I’ve Blasted you,” sans says.  “Because you’re an annoying twerp who attacked me first.  Because for some reason, you think everyone has to die.  Do you remember each time?”

Flowey yawns.  “Do you remember something you shouldn’t?” he asks.

“Shouldn’t?” sans asks, annoyed now. 

Flowey grins maniacally.  “Why don’t you go and deliver some more terrible jokes to whoever it is behind that door?”

For a flower that shouldn’t be able to move, Flowey disappears rather quickly.

Sans shoves his hands deeper into his pockets and heads to the giant door.

~~

The weirdness continues.  For a second time (though sans begins to wonder if it hasn’t been more) the lady on the other side of the door pleads with sans to keep a human safe, should one cross his path. 

Once again, sans finds himself making a promise that he will.  Deep in his bones, he has the feeling that this is what got Papyrus killed. 

But Papyrus isn’t dead.  So he makes the promise. 

~~

sans tries to find spare time to study.  It’s hard, with all of the sleeping and slacking off quotas he has to fill.  But he manages.

It is the same sort of studying that taught sans all about the shortcuts.  It’s come in handy, enabling him to have multiple sentry stations to not-really-man.  Also, it means he can get in and out of Grillby’s quickly. 

Such study has also taught him about the concept of a SAVE in the past.  Though sans has never been able to do such a thing.  He contemplates if this is how Flowey never really dies. 

But then sans comes across a new term: RESET. 

~~

It’s the same human.  Except this time, instead of wielding a knife, the kid has a stick tucked into their back pocket.  It gets pulled out once against a Gryfroot in almost a grim determination.  The human gets through Papyrus’ puzzles easier, it seems. 

But when it comes time to fight Papyrus, the human does not kill him—but instead is captured by Papyrus and put into the shed that Papyrus had made just for the occasion.  Sans begins to breathe a little easier. 

Eventually, Papyrus sends the human on their way and suggests hanging out sometime. 

The human doesn’t come back.

But that doesn’t mean sans doesn’t keep an eye on them. 

~~

In the end, sans judges the kid.  He takes the time to explain EXP and LV.  The kid looks uncomfortable, like they’re contemplating something.  sans wonders if he’ll wake up in his bed in just a few moments. 

It isn’t the case.  Things go down and the King is killed.  Flowey disappears too, which is an odd coincidence. 

sans finds out that the lady he’d been telling jokes to is actually the exiled Queen.  She returns and declares that all humans should be treated with kindness and not killed.  Papyrus’ friend Undyne, however, isn’t having any of that.

She stages a coup.  Queen Toriel returns to the ruins.  sans elects to go with her and Papyrus elects to go with him.  There’s something about appreciating a woman who appreciates his jokes. 

It’s a nice life, more or less. 

~~

“SANS WAKE UP!” Papyrus yells, banging on the door. 

~~

It continues for a while.  sans grows more suspicious of Flowey, though it’s clear that it’s the human that’s doing this.  RESETting things and all. 

sans continually makes the promise to help the human out.  Continually hides the human behind a conveniently-shaped lamp.  There’s some puzzles. 

The human comes back to hang with Papyrus after a couple more times through.  Once, the human and Papyrus even go on a “date.”  sans knows Papyrus though, it wasn’t really a date.  Papyrus doesn’t understand dates.

sans finds himself growing more attached to Toriel, though he has to pretend not to know who she is or what her name is at first.  He berates himself though.  At some point, the magical RESET will happen, and he’ll be waking back up in his bed, with Papyrus knocking on his door. 

He and the kid start having lunch at Grillby’s.  He stacks hotdogs on the kids’ head in Hotland.  He tells the kid about what Toriel made him promise to do.  _That_ conversation is laced with the knowledge that if the kid tries anything funny again—like that first time with Papyrus—sans would kill the kid with no mercy. 

Eventually, something changes so that Undyne doesn’t overthrow the Queen anymore.  Apparently, the human befriended her.  Though, Undyne is still upset over what happened to Asgore and she worries about Alphys’ depression. 

At some other point, Flowey stops disappearing when the King does.  Though, now he mutters about stupid fan clubs.  sans wonders if Papyrus had anything to do with that.

No one remembers anything after each RESET.  No one aside from Flowey, and possibly the human. 

Probably the human remembers.

~~

If it were possible, sans gets lazier.  Papyrus hates it.  But what’s the point?

sans continues to search for anyone else with memories of other timelines.  He finds no one.

~~

“SANS WAKE UP!” Papyrus yells, banging on the door. 

~~

Something is different this time, sans can feel it.  He laughs as Papyrus tries to date the kid.  He trolls the kid with a telescope in Waterfall.  He sleeps through Undyne chasing the kid into Hotland.  All stuff he’s done before. 

But something is still different.

When it comes time to Judge the kid—something sans has been doing since that time after Papyrus—it becomes clear that the kid didn’t gain any LV.

But the kid got _love_.

sans is emotional.  He’s awkward about it.  He calls the kid “friend.”

The kid hugs him.

~~

As sans prepares to leave, Toriel comes rushing through.  sans half-disappears through a shortcut so as not to run into her.  She doesn’t see him on her way past.

“I _won’t_ let that terrible man mercilessly take another innocent SOUL,” she growls.

sans decides he wants to stick around for this.  Perhaps Papyrus should be around too.

~~

Papyrus brings Undyne who bring Alphys.  They arrive just as Toriel is berating King Asgore.  He looks sheepish (even for a goat), but also cowardly.  sans is intrigued.

Flowey arrives.  That stupid twerp of a Flower.  Unfortunately, once Flowey absorbed all the human SOULS, the flower became sort of all-powerful.  sans does his best to protect the kid—as does everyone else Flowey captured.

Then everything goes black.

~~

sans awakes about the same time everyone else does.  The Barrier’s shattered, but the kid is still sleeping.  Toriel is absolutely worried.  sans tries to console her as best he can.  He doesn’t have any good puns for the occasion.  But at least the kid’s still breathing. 

The kid wakes up.  Their name is Frisk.  They want to go on a walk before going through the Barrier.  Papyrus vibrates intensely at the thought of meeting more humans.

sans wonders how long this all will last. 

~~

It’s been a while since a RESET. 

Frisk is good with the puns, quiet as they are.  Toriel is a good roommate.  sans enjoys it while it lasts.  For once, he’s trying.  After all, it’s been a while. 

Papyrus is a good ambassador to the humans.  sans mostly keeps his interaction with them to a minimum.  He’s still lazy after all.

~~

One evening, sans sits on the couch, watching human TV.  It’s not one of those Animes that Alphys and Undyne are all over.  It’s a more serious show.  Well, it’s Science Fiction.  In this particular episode, one day keeps looping, but only two of the characters recognize it.  sans appreciates the humor.

Frisk arrives, wrapped up in a blanket.  They snuggle up on the couch next to sans.

“I wonder if I could save everybody,” they murmur.

sans’ eye twitches.  “Who didn’t you save?” he asks.  Simultaneously, he racks his brain.  The kid had done everything right that last time… sans couldn’t think of a single person they hadn’t saved. 

“Asriel,” the kid whispers.  “Chara.”

sans silently begs the kid not to reset.  But he doesn’t say anything.  If there’s a better way to do it and more people to be saved…

“You know, don’t you?” Frisk asks.  “That we’ve done this all before.”

sans nods. 

“It gets tiring, doesn’t it?”

sans nods again.

“I’m sorry about Papyrus that first time.”

“Took you until now to apologize?”

“I didn’t want to believe you remembered,” Frisk says quietly.

“You know,” sans replies.  “I suppose I’ve called you friend for this long, I can’t just take it back.”

Frisk smiles faintly.  “I won’t ever do that again.”

sans doesn’t ask if Frisk is merely talking about Papyrus, or the reset. 

**Author's Note:**

> So, I finished this on Groundhog Day. Which makes me oddly happy. See: the Stargate Episode "Groundhog Day." That's really all I have to say. I'm pretty sure the rest of it speaks for itself.


End file.
